November 18, 2018

Around the Ivy League: Princeton Crowned Champs, Cornell Not Last

While Cornell football saw its season come to a close in heartbreaking fashion in Manhattan, Princeton celebrated winning the Ivy title just a stone’s throw away in New Jersey.

Princeton’s win in its season finale against Penn capped off an undefeated season, and cemented the Tigers as outright Ivy champions. The Red battled for a 3-4 Ivy record, but instead fell to 2-5 in a heartbreaker at Columbia making Cornell’s final record only better than that of winless Brown.

Princeton 42 Penn 14

Princeton controlled its own destiny entering the final week of the season. All that stood in between Princeton and the Ivy League title were the Penn Quakers. The Tigers came through, netting 579 yards on offense in a performance typical of this year’s Princeton team. Princeton scored three unanswered touchdowns to start the game and Penn had a tough time climbing out from the early deficit. Wide receiver Jesper Horsted had a four-touchdown game and quarterback John Lovett set an Ivy record by rushing for a touchdown in twenty straight games.

Princeton’s 10-0 mark is the program’s first undefeated season since 1964 and its first outright Ivy title since 1995.

Dartmouth 49 Brown 7

Dartmouth’s Ivy League fate hung on the outcome of the Penn-Princeton game, needing a Princeton loss for a share of the Ivy title.

Meanwhile, it took care of business on its end against the hapless Brown Bears. Although the score was tied at seven nearing the end of the first half, Dartmouth exploded in the second half, scoring 29 third-quarter points to pull away. Brown was stymied by Dartmouth’s defense actually losing 23 yards on the ground for the day.

The loss leaves Brown without an Ivy League win this year.

Harvard 45 Yale 27

Harvard and Yale faced off on “neutral ground” in Fenway Park, home of the Boston Red Sox, each looking to finish the season with a winning conference record. This year’s iteration of “The Game,” usually an ode to old-school low scoring football, was a shootout. Harvard’s 605 yards of offense and the teams’ combined 72 points are both records for the annual showdown.

Yale nipped at Harvard’s heels the entire game, even taking a momentary lead in the third quarter, and the two age-old foes entered the fourth quarter only four points apart. But the Crimson’s defense held fast, forcing Yale to settle for a field goal before Harvard’s offense took over to score back-to-back touchdowns and pull away.

The Crimson’s Zach Miller led the charge on defense with two interceptions while Harvard QB Tom Stewart passed for 312 yards and three touchdowns.

Related

Conference play is already underway in the Ivy League, as Cornell traveled to New Haven to challenge the defending champion Bulldogs and Brown faced off against Harvard in the first ever night game in the 104 year history of Harvard Stadium, the oldest stadium in college football.
While Dartmouth finds itself as the only winless team aside from Penn, it is also the only Ivy team besides Yale with more touchdowns than Yale junior Mike McCleod, who was held to only three scores this weekend after scoring four touchdowns at Georgetown in the opener.

With conference play just under a month away, Ancient Eight soccer was in full force this weekend with all sixteen Ivy League men’s and women’s soccer teams in action. With most teams having played only three or four matches, the Brown and Harvard men remain the only two teams yet to taste defeat.

Men’s Soccer

Harvard 1, Maine 0
Harvard 2, Providence 1

Harvard came into the weekend ranked No. 13 in the nation and remained undefeated by beating Maine and Providence, 1-0, and 2-1, respectively. Harvard moved to 3-0 with strong play between the pipes from senior co-captain Adam Hahn and a pair of goals off the foot of junior Michael Fucito against Providence.